


A Cabin in the Highlands

by celluloidbroomcloset



Category: The Avengers (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Angst, F/M, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-24
Updated: 2015-09-27
Packaged: 2018-04-17 01:14:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4646811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/celluloidbroomcloset/pseuds/celluloidbroomcloset
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set during The Wringer. After escaping from the Ministry's torture-facility in the Highlands, Steed and Cathy have to hide out while Steed regains his memory and Cathy tries to convince him he's not a traitor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

He had carried her part of the way. Through the pounding, unforgiving rain, across bleak, sodden countryside, he’d supported her, with one arm around her waist, her good arm slung across his stout shoulders. Not a word, not a joke, nothing to lighten the mood, as they moved, relentlessly onwards, searching for…what? A doctor, a friend, anyone to assist. Cathy wracked her brain over what their next step should be. She tried to ask Steed if he knew the terrain, or had ever been there before, but was only rewarded by a blank stare. That same sad, vacant expression in his eyes, no warmth or certainy. As bleak as the landscape. She couldn’t worry about that now. There would be time for that later, after her arm was repaired, after they were warm, and safe, away from the Ministry jackals and their hired torturers. 

The anger welled in her heart and boiled over, warming her. That was good. That was strength, even if it couldn’t last. She had survived Robert’s death like that - propelled by her anger, keeping herself alive with the promise of retribution. Retribution would never come, but it helped to repeat in silence, that she would pay them back for what they did, that she would destroy them, kill them, hurt them at least, for how they made him suffer. And as she repeated it, through the rain and the darkness, terrified to hear the snapping of hounds at her heels, she began to have difficulty distinguishing between that desperate flight from the uprising in Kenya, and the sodden countryside through which she now fled. 

Eventually, one of two things had to happen: they would either both collapse from exhaustion, or they would find aid. Cathy was realist enough to recognize that, but she was also human enough to be extraordinarily thankful to what deity or deities exist or might have existed when she saw, through the shivering rain, the faint glimmer of an artificial light. Towards this they moved, until it had grown, doubled, and finally transformed into a small collection of houses, huddled together as if for warmth. 

It might have been too much to hope that someone would be out on a night like this, and Cathy was prepared to begin banging on the first door she came to, but once again someone or something smiled on them. There were several men coming out of the pub - big, rough, bluff-looking men, a trifle the worse for drink, but apparently friendly in their way. Cathy tried to ask directions from them, while Steed stood, solid and blank as a slate. Thankfully, none of the men inquired as to why these two people, covered in mud and grime, were asking the way to the doctor’s house. At first Cathy could not quite understand their dialect - also somewhat the worse for drink - and after straining for several minutes, it was Steed who turned to her. 

“Third house on the right from the pub.”

Cathy didn’t stop to question. 

By the time they reached the door, she was on the point of collapse. Her arm had gone numb and the nameplate “McEwan” swam in her vision. But Steed pounded on the door and brought the household from their dinner.

“She’s hurt,” Cathy heard him say as he practically carried her inside. 

What happened next was a blur - they might have been hours, or minutes, but she didn’t know which and no longer cared. The loss of blood, the apparently endless trek, the fear that would have paralyzed her - all of it was too much for her nerves. She didn’t faint - Dr. Catherine Gale does not faint - but she certainly could not have said how long she lay on the table in the doctor’s consulting room, or the contents of the needle that went into her arm. The last thing she remembered was Steed’s strained face, his wet hair hanging over his brow, and the horrible blank expression in his eyes. Then there was a warm, welcoming darkness, and then nothing. 

Cathy awoke to the sensation of being wrapped in a gauze that covered her entire body from head to foot. This was followed by a violent terror that had her sitting up, struggling against what proved to be nothing more than a flannel comforter and a thick, soft pillow. As she looked around the room and saw the broad back of a man turned away from her and towards the clock on the wall, it came back to her: where she was, and who she was with.

“Steed?” she asked of the man’s back. He turned, his brow furrowed into two straight lines that reminded her of a small boy concentrating on building bricks. He smiled, a vague, mirthless smile. His hand still clasped her watch, holding it against his chest as though it was all that held him to the earth. 

“How are you feeling?” he asked. 

Cathy pushed herself back against the pillows. Her right arm was wrapped in bandages and ached with a dull, ceaseless pain that throbbed along to the beat of her heart.

“I’m all right.” She eyed him carefully. “How are you?”

He tapped his right arm. “You were lucky. The bullet passed straight through.”

“I’m glad. Steed, are you all right?”

His eyes met hers. Not so blank any more, but with a depth of sorrow behind them now that worried her more than the blankness had. He wore a thick wool sweater obviously given him by the doctor and was clean again, his smooth face speaking of a new razor and a bath.

“I wanted to thank you,” he said. “For…doing what you did for me.”

“I did what anyone would do.”

He shook his head. “Not anyone. But I wanted to…ask…you…”

Steed looked confused for a moment. Then he grabbed a chair from the wall and pulled it up close to her bed. The hand holding the watch rested on the comforter, turning the timepiece over and over.

“Mrs. Gale, I don’t understand. Why you did that. Why you didn’t leave me there.”

Her heart contracted. “I couldn’t leave you there, Steed. You know that I wouldn’t.”

“I don’t understand.” When he raised his gaze to hers, there was great clarity in his grey eyes. “Why would you risk your life for a traitor?”


	2. Chapter 2

The cabin was as isolated as it could be - a bare two rooms at the edge of the Loch, four walls against the wind and rain, with a large fireplace and wood-burning stove to keep out the worst of the damp. A fishing cabin, Dr. McEwan had said, where they would be safe for now. Cathy had taken the chance to confide in him, telling him enough of the story to convince him - she hoped - that they were the good guys. He seemed convinced enough of that already, though she could not have said it for a fact. After all, to all appearances they might have been highway robbers. But he agreed to give them the run of his cabin by the Loch - it’s surname unpronouncable to Cathy’s somewhat unpracticed ears - as a place of refuge. Cathy did not try to get a promise of silence out of him, though she might have received one if she did. She didn’t want to place him in such a position. But he did remark, before they left, that he would find a way to send word if there was any difficulty. 

They had to carry their own supplies in, and there was no town for many accessible miles around. It suited Cathy well enough. The harder it was for them to get in, the harder it would be for anyone to find them. She estimated that they had a week, perhaps less, before the Ministry spies or the people from the Unit found them. She hoped it would be enough. 

Steed proved to still be very malleable. He didn’t object to the plan or to the cabin, although he repeated more than once that it was “no use.” His memory of his time spent in The Unit was unclear. He seemed to think that he had been interrogated, or at least summarily questioned. His one overarching conviction was of his treachery, and Cathy had not had the time or the energy to probe further yet. How deeply the idea had been entrenched would make the difference. If she could not convince Steed that he was no traitor, there was no hope in protecting him from either the Wringer or from the Ministry. 

So, barely two days after their escape overland, Cathy and Steed made the long drive and longer trek to the cabin in the Highlands. 

It was already growing dark when they finally made it, the grey day turning a darker shade as what remained of the sun began to set. A steady fog began to come in, and with it a light, misting rain that soaked to the bone. No sooner had they set their supplies down than Steed went out again to find wood for the stove and fireplace. Cathy tried to set their new rooms to rights, just to give herself something to do to take her mind off the days that must lie ahead. Her partner had been curiously silent during the drive and the walk, not objecting but not attempting his usual flippant banter that usually annoyed her. She missed it now as she missed the sparkle in the eyes and even the lecherous comments on her outfits. In two days he’d not made a pass, not teased her or joked with her, not even exploded at her. He’d been quiet, with a blank, terrible sadness in his face. Though he’d been attentive to her needs, bringing her tea and food and reading materials, sitting with her for as long as she liked, he had not been the same Steed she knew. Now, as he carried the load of wood in and dropped it on the hearth, she wondered if she was truly looking at a stranger. 

“I’ll just build up the fire then, shall I?” he asked, and without waiting for a response began to stack the wood like a good scout. 

Cathy found herself at a loss at how to talk to him. It surprised her to admit it, but this was the first time she’d ever felt uncomfortable with Steed. 

Soon the fire blazed and warm air began to circulate through the cabin. Steed rose to his feet and began looking around for something else to do. 

“Steed,” said Cathy. “Sit down, will you? I want to talk to you.”

Obediently he came and sat beside her in one of the comfortable wooden chairs, his long legs jutted out towards the fire. 

“Yes, Mrs. Gale?”

“Oh, for God’s sake, Steed, you sound like a schoolboy. I’m Cathy.”

“Cathy, then.” He didn’t look at her, his dark gaze trained on the fire. 

“Steed, I want you to tell me the last thing you remember before you were sent to the Unit.”

“The trial.”

“When Hal accused you?”

“Yes.”

“What did he say, Steed?”

“That I betrayed the Corinthian Pipeline.”

“How?”

“I met with enemy agents in Vienna.”

“When?”

“May.”

“And did you meet with enemy agents in Vienna?”

“Hal said I did.”

“But did you?” She leaned forward, trying to see his face. 

“Of course I did.”

“Steed, you weren’t in Vienna in May. You were in Norway. I got a postcard from Oslo, with a very crass dancing girl on it. I can show you when we get back to London.”

“I was in Vienna. Hal said I was.”

“Steed…”

“Mrs. Gale, I know what you’re trying to do, but it’s no use. I know what I did and eventually I’ll have to take the consequences of it.”

Cathy sighed. She was going to find a way of convincing him of his own innocence. She would have to take a page out of the Wringer’s own handbook: break him down, and prove to him perfectly, logically, that he could not be a traitor. But first they needed to eat and regain their strength. 

Even with one arm, she was still a better cook than him, but he did make an admirable sous chef. While Steed chopped according to her instructions, Cathy set the beef broiling. They relaxed, to a degree at least, into their accustomed roles. Steed even opened the bottle of wine of his own accord, and commented on its qualities, using words that rolled right over Cathy’s head but that she enjoyed for their own sake. 

It wasn’t until they sat down to eat that Cathy became aware of a difficulty she had not considered: she couldn’t cut her own food. For a moment she stared at the beautiful beef bourgignon before her, prepared - if she did say so herself - with loving care. Then she glanced at Steed. He noticed before she did and without a word began to carefully cut up her beef into bite-sized pieces. He said nothing, but pushed the plate towards her and went about eating his own meal. She wished to God that he would tease her. 

Dinner finished in silence, Steed put the plates in the sink and did the washing up - all without saying much. Then he found a cigar in his knapsack and went outside to smoke it, using the excuse that he didn’t want to fill up the small cabin with fumes.

Cathy sat alone by the fire, trying not to think. The emptiness of the cabin began to seep through her skin and infect her heart, just as the emptiness of the farmhouse had those years ago in Kenya. She could just see Steed standing beneath the eaves, looking out at the black Highland night. But was he Steed? Was he the same man she’d met almost two years ago, that grinning flirt in the museum, making stupid jokes about Yorick? She had seen him in almost every mood, argued with him more than she cared to consider, fought with him, wrestled with him. But there had been quiet moments too, dinner and dancing, stock car races, history lectures; even just calm moments in their flats, cooking, listening to music, watching the telly. She wondered how he could stand out there so calmly now, smoking his cigar in the misting night, and what he thought of, if he thought at all. Even if she could break through the horrible fantasy they’d injected into him, would the real Steed, the one she knew, ever truly come back? Or would he be empty, always questioning his own loyalty, always wondering if maybe he was right and she - his friend, his partner - was wrong?

Cathy shook the thoughts from her head. That was a pointless exercise, these what-ifs and wherefores. She needed to live in the here and now. She had to make Steed remember, or at least make him realize what the Wringer had done to him. She had to prove to both his conscious and unconscious mind that he was not the man they told him he was. She was the only one he could depend on, when he couldn’t even depend on himself. If she failed, there was no one else. 

That idea in itself strengthened her and she finished off her brandy with a flourish, resisting the urge to fling the glass into the fire. As she did so, Steed returned, shaking the damp from his hair. He made a sound like a horse.

“It’s starting to rain,” he said, rubbing his hands together as he came towards the fire. “What a country.”

“Some people go on vacations in the Highlands,” said Cathy. She rose and tilted a little more brandy into her glass, then poured out one for him. 

“Not me,” said Steed, taking up his glass. “Give me a sandy beach, the sun blazing bright in the cloudless sky, a good Mai-tai with scads of ice…”

“And an icy blonde to top it all off?” 

Steed smiled. “That is a vacation, Mrs. Gale. If I want freezing rain and wind, I can stay in London.”

Cathy shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know. It is rather cosy: the wind out there, the fire in here.”

She drew her knee up, her stockinged feet point at the fire. 

“And you look cosy,” said Steed, his eyes tracing her form with a hint of that usual, lascivious appreciation that had repulsed and attracted her on more than one occasion. Now it was simply a welcome demonstration that the real Steed still remained, even if it was attached to a libido. 

Having warmed himself by the fire, Steed began pulling a little uncomfortably at his woolen sweater, already steaming from the rain outside and the fire within. 

“I say, Cathy, would you mind if I slip into something a trifle more comfortable?”

“What did you have in mind?”

“Pajamas, if I can find the pair that McEwan loaned me.” 

Cathy smiled and got up. “There’s not much place for me to go, but I promise not to look.”

“Look all you like. I’m not shy.” He winked at her. “If you’re a good little girl, I might even let you touch.”

Cathy rolled her eyes, but could not summon much annoyance at the moment. Hearing him talk like his old self, if only briefly, made her hopeful. She turned to try and find her own pajamas in the mess of knapsacks on the bed. It was hard enough managing with only one good arm, much less one that ached every time she moved. She hoped she wouldn’t have to ask Steed to help her put on pajamas. She did all right until it came time to button her own shirt - the pajamas McEwan had also given her were not of the feminine variety, but they were warm and soft and that was as much as she could ask for. But trying to work the big buttons into the tight little holes proved to be nigh impossible. 

“Damn it!” she finally expostulated. She felt the air move behind her and Steed’s approach. 

“Oh, let me help,” he said. 

“I’m not an infant, Steed.”

“No, infants make less to-do when people try to help them. Here.” 

He turned her around with a firm hand on her shoulder and did up the buttons quickly before she could protest again. 

“Not enough experience with male pajamas, Mrs. Gale,” he said, grinning. 

“I have never tried to button a pair using only one hand, Mr. Steed.”

“Tsk tsk. Practice does make perfect.” 

She looked up at him. His proximity was becoming a tad embarrassing, even more so when she considered how very handsome he looked in the firelight, his curly hair still damp from the rain, and fine grey eyes reflecting some of the dancing flames. She wanted to touch him, to hold him even, and prove to him and to herself that he was real, and that there was nothing to be afraid of. She felt what she had felt those few minutes in the Unit, when he was hellbent on fixing his watch - a desperation to protect him and a sense of helplessness that she couldn’t.

“Good night, Steed,” she said, hoping for something more.

“Good night, Cathy.”

She watched as he went and laid down in his sleeping bag by the fire, hands behind his head. She went to the bed - a small but basically comfortable twin that she had to arrange herself in carefully to avoid pressure on her arm. The sheets were cold. She lay there, staring at the ceiling, her arm throbbing occasionally. She could hear Steed shifting in his sleeping bag, making those annoyed little grunts that indicate a difficulty getting to sleep. She was cold, shivering. And she was frightened. Every noise outside might be the Ministry dogs, having caught up to them. Every plunk of rain could be a knock on the door, seeking to drag Steed out and away and she…what would she do if they took him off? How could she explain her actions? What would she say? 

“Steed,” she said, finally, sitting up. “There’s enough room for both of us.”

Steed rolled over and looked at her. “What?”

“In the bed. It’s freezing over here, but it would be warmer if you…there’s enough room. We’d both be more comfortable.”

He looked steadily back at her. Then he got out of the sleeping bag and came over. 

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure. Please. I think we’d both be warmer.”

Without another word, he climbed in beside her. Cathy moved up against his side, her bad arm resting on his chest. 

“I’ll try not to jostle you,” he said. 

“Shh. Go to sleep.”

“Yes, Mrs. Gale.”

His arms were warm, his body was warm. Cathy closed her eyes and let her head drop on the pillow beside his. Within a few seconds, she was asleep.


	3. Chapter 3

The next day was grey but clear - good enough weather for hill-walking in the Highlands, and Cathy felt a powerful need to move about. Bundling up in sweaters and waterproofs, they made their way out onto the narrow path that led into the hills overlooking the Loch. Cathy’s arm throbbed with an ache that seemed to seep into her stomach, jostling about her breakfast of oatmeal and instant coffee. But she knew that movement, not too strenuous, was important, and in any case she could not have remained in the cabin another moment. Steed remained as solicitous and charming as ever, and even a bit more his old self, but there was still that sudden vacancy in the eyes. The constant knowledge that he claimed for himself a traitor’s fate hung between them, cutting them off from each other. It was as though the man that Cathy knew now denied his own existence. She felt a rush of anger that morning when she saw him at the breakfast table, blithely eating his oatmeal; an absurd sense that he was killing the man that she knew and, in her weakest moments, admitted that she cared for. 

As they walked, Cathy saw the new dual nature of her partner in sharp relief against the grey and brown background of the Highlands. Steed stopped every once in awhile to cast a stone off the path, or bend to pick up a stick, swinging it as he did his umbrella. At one point, he even sprang before her, a long stick in his hand, parrying with it like a fencing foil. Then the grin overspread his face - that beloved, insouciant grin of the child and the man - and Cathy felt a lightening of her heart. 

She was finally obliged to sit, supporting her still aching arm on her leg, when they found a rock on the sheer side of the hill. Looking below, they could see the Loch and the tip of the cabin’s chimney concealed just beyond it. It had a terrible, austere kind of beauty - the world of London, the Ministry, and even the Unit seemed far away now. But the pulse in her arm beat on, a constant aching reminder of the grave danger of their situation. 

“How’re you feeling?” Steed asked.

Cathy rankled a little. What right had he to be so solicitous, when she was the one who needed to do the saving? 

“I’ve been injured before, Steed,” she replied. 

“I just don’t want to have to carry you back. Again.”

“When have you ever needed to carry me?” 

She saw him open his mouth to respond, but he held back. A smile pulled at the corner of his mouth, and she responded to it with the same. A new, friendly silence settled over them. Cathy waited, knowing she had to begin the conversation. The longer they waited, the more firmly embedded in his mind the dossier would become, as he filled in the gaps not yet completed in the Unit. It might be too late, even now. 

“Steed, when did you meet with enemy agents in Vienna?”

He leaned forward with his elbows on his knees. “We’ve been through all that before.”

“Let’s go through it again.”

“I know what I did, Cathy.”

“Tell me, Steed.”

“I met with the agents in Vienna in May.”

“And how much were you paid by them?”

“What?”

“How much did you get paid?”

He paused. “Two thousand pounds.”

“Where did the money go?”

“It was…it was held by a Swiss bank, like the rest.”

“Which bank?”

She could see the confusion in his face. They hadn’t been able to get that far in the dossier, or if they had, it didn’t stick. She would press ahead.

“How long were you working for them?”

“Two years.”

“Who was your main contact?”

“A man named Trevelyn.”

“What did he look like?”

Another pause. “I never saw him.”

“How did you contact him?”

“Through…it must have been…” 

Again the struggle. Bits and pieces remained: names, dates, perhaps even events, but nothing concrete, nothing like a man’s face or his mannerisms. Steed was trained to remember the small things, but now the small things were a blank. Eventually, his mind would supply the additions, like a description in a book. It was hard to plant an entire memory into a man’s mind, no matter how well broken he was. And Steed was a stronger subject than most - certainly stronger than Hal had been. 

“I must have contacted him somehow,” muttered Steed. Cathy leaned forward, joggling him before his unconscious mind could supply a reasonable explanation. 

“You don’t know.”

“I do know! I just…”

“You don’t, Steed. You can tell me the name of your contact, but not what he looks like. You can tell me that you were paid, but not where the money went. You can only tell me part of the story, not the whole story, and what’s missing you’ll eventually supply out of your own mind. It’s a lie, Steed.”

Too late she realized she had pushed it too far. He jolted to his feet, his hands squeezed tight. 

“I know what I did, Cathy!”

There was torture in his face, but she could not afford to hold back now. 

“You’ve been working in intelligence for years, Steed. Why now? Why turn all of a sudden? What happened to make you do it?”

“I…” 

“Nothing happened, because you didn’t turn. You didn’t, do you understand me? You’re not a traitor.”

“I am. I can remember…I know I am.”

“Why? Tell me why.”

But he couldn’t. He just looked at the ground with that heart-breaking, lost look. His hands squeezed together so tightly that the knuckles and fingers stood out white. 

“Hal said…”

“Hal was lying, Steed, though he didn’t know it. He’d been in the Unit too.”

“Hal wouldn’t lie.”

“He didn’t mean to, but he was.”

“What do you know about it?” His voice was sharp with hate. “You go through training with someone and you know them! Hal wouldn’t lie, not about that. They’d never break him. He’d not betray me.”

Cathy stood, anger overriding her better instincts. “He wasn’t trying to lie, Steed. He thought he was telling the truth. That’s what they were doing to you - to make you believe a lie, to turn it into your truth. That’s why…”

“No.” 

It was a flat word, but it carried such an undercurrent of threat that Cathy stopped dead in her tracks as she tried to move towards him. There was no more hatred in his eyes - just the blank glare of a trained killer. The world around them suddenly grew very cold. 

“You’re not going to change my mind. I know what I am,” said Steed. “You shouldn’t care if I turn myself in, and if you do…”

“If I do, what? That means I’m one of them? Who is them? The people you supposedly work for, the Ministry, who?” Against her better instincts, seeking the man she knew he was, Cathy took that step towards him. “Steed, what about me? Do you think I would risk so much for a traitor? We’ve known each other for the better part of two years - do you think I could ever defend a man capable of betraying his friends and his country? Do you?”

His eyes moved to hers. “I’m sure I don’t know, Mrs. Gale.”

Then he turned and walked back down the path without another word. 

Cathy remained, a sense of total loss overwhelming her. She had pushed too far, too quickly, said too much. Until now they had been one, and now…

She tried to follow, but he had moved too fast for her and soon she was alone. Her arm ached horribly, worse than before. She had walked too far. She felt nauseous. Halfway down the hill, she sat down on a log by the path, cradling her arm. It felt like it was bleeding again; the pain turned from throbbing to a sharp stabs. Tears sprang to her eyes. She looked around at the darkening, barren landscape, where she was finally alone. Her partner was gone, involved in his own pained struggle, hating her for trying to break through the terrible but comforting construction placed carefully in his mind. He had to know that it was wrong, that the holes were there, but he would fight it rather than accept that his friend had lied, and that he had been broken. It was far better to know yourself a traitor than to think yourself so susceptible to violation. 

Cathy closed her eyes. She wanted to cry. She had not cried for a very long time, not even when Robert died. It was as though she couldn’t any more. She knew she had to stand and walk, but it seemed so pointless. He wasn’t coming back. And that thought, among all the others, made her feel the most helpless. She looked up at the clouded sky. It was beginning to mist again. A minute passed, but she didn’t have a watch. She’d given him her watch. Another minute, and another, ticking by with nothing to measure them with. She needed to walk, but she didn’t want to. Her breaths were steady as the sharp pains in her arm. 

“Cathy? Cathy!” 

She didn’t want to open her eyes. 

“Cathy!”

A hand on her good shoulder, shaking her. She willed her eyes to open. A dark figure stood against the greying sky. She could not see his eyes. 

“Are you hurt?” Steed asked. 

“I…don’t feel well,” she replied. 

Without so much as a by-your-leave, he pushed aside her hand and squatted to examine her shoulder. 

“We need to get you indoors,” he said. “You’re pale.”

“Steed…”

“Can you walk?”

“I don’t know. ”

He grabbed her good arm and hauled her to her feet. Cathy’s legs felt numb. After a few paces, she doubled over, and wanted to be sick. 

“Please, Steed.” She did not know what she begged for. 

“I’m going to carry you. Put your arm around my neck.”

“I don’t need to be carried.”

“Humor me.”

It was comforting, though, to be lifted suddenly from her inexplicably weak legs. They weren’t so far from the cabin, it seemed, because before she knew it, Steed was setting her back on her feet in order to open the cabin door. Once inside, he gave her water and left her sitting in one of the two chairs while he built the fire to a warm roar. Then he turned to her. 

“Take off your shirt.”

“What?”

“That wound might be infected - take off your shirt.”

He turned to the medical kit the doctor had supplied them with and began rummaging in search of fresh bandages and disinfectant.

Cathy didn’t move. 

“Come along, Mrs. Gale, now’s not the time to play shrinking violet. I give you my word as a gentleman that I shan’t reveal any of your maidenly secrets.”

She shook her head. “I can’t lift my arm.”

With Steed’s help, she was able to finally remove her sweater and blouse beneath. The warm flames began to ward the chill from her skin, though her nausea remained. It grew worse when she saw that the blood had indeed soaked through her bandage. She watched Steed’s big, capable hands as he set about cleaning the trickling wound. Her arm felt like it was very far away from herself.

“You’ve got an infection,” said Steed. 

“I can see that.”

He daubed at it with an alcohol swab. A tingle of pain rushed up her arm. “We need to get you back to McEwan.”

“No.”

He looked up at her. “If it gets worse…”

“It’s not going to.”

“Cathy…”

She hated this. She was supposed to be helping him, not the other way around. 

“Patch it up,” she said. 

He sighed, but did as he was told. He changed the dressing and wrapped it all up. When he was done, he stayed lingering there by her knees, his eyes on the ground. 

“You don’t want to go back because of me,” he said. 

“Yes.”

“Why do you have such faith that I’m not what they say I am?”

“Because I know you, Steed.”

He sighed, and sat back on his heels. The eyes that had lately been so blank now just looked sad, and a little confused. There was no hatred in them. 

“Tell me what you know about the Unit.”


	4. Chapter 4

“Is there anything I can get you, Mrs. Gale?”

“No, Steed.”

“Another brandy? Tea? Coffee?” 

“Steed…”

“The electric grinder’s working again. I have some excellent Kenyan beans. I’d be happy to…”

“Steed, you’re hovering.”

Cathy almost regretted saying it, he looked so abashed at her words. But he was becoming a little intolerable, flitting about her like a mother hen looking after a little chick. An injured little chick. Never mind that it had been over a week since their return from the Highlands, never mind that her arm felt much better, never mind that she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself; he still insisted on trying to wait on her. Yet, for all the annoyance, there was something very endearing about his clumsy attempts to take care of her. 

She wished he would sit down, though. He’d been leaping up to get her things all evening - everything from a drink, food, and once a sweater when she happened to mention that the weather outside was growing chilly. It was an odd position to be in, with Steed of all people. 

Now he just stood there, bouncing on the balls of his feet, looking like he wanted to be doing something, anything. Cathy relented.

“Kenyan sounds excellent.”

His face lit up and then he was in the kitchen, rattling around with the dishes and cutlery and probably making a terrible mess with the grounds. She had to smile, listening to him - he even began to sing, off-key and in a curious, warbling way, something from the last Disney film. 

It was such a change from those last days in the cabin, where he sat, dark of face and aspect, and listened to her, and tried to remember. Once she had convinced him that he might be mistaken about his treacherous past he began to hear what she said. He still fought with the idea that Hal lied, but he no longer attempted to fill the empty spaces in his memory with reasonable explanations. The more they talked, the more he seemed to believe her, even if he did not have such strong faith in himself. Her faith in him seemed to restore him. 

Cathy had been frightened when she went back to London, leaving Steed to battle it out with Hal on his own. She didn’t know but that she might return to find him back in the clutches of the Wringer - or worse, having convinced himself of his treachery, have confessed to all. But instead she found the same Steed she had always known, with the same glint of self-satisfaction in his eyes as he led his enemies off to imprisonment. When he blithely suggested that he was “ready to do anything” for her, clicking his tongue and winking, she had never been so happy. 

She was still happy, despite the annoyance of his undivided attention. Happy in the silly little domestic things, happy to be home in London, happy even for the occasional ache or itch of her healing arm. It had been a harrowing few weeks, but it was over now. 

Steed came back into the room bearing the coffee pot and two cups on a tray. He evaded her when she tried to take it from her, deftly setting it on the coffee table and pouring out before she could even get back to her seat. She didn’t try to stop him when he added cream and sugar (which she never took) and passed the cup to her. They sat sipping in silence, as at ease with one another as they had ever been. 

“Filthy day,” said Steed, gesturing at the rain guttering down the window. 

“Mm.” Cathy swirled the sickly brown liquid in her cup. Why would he think she’d enjoy having the flavor of good beans obscured?

“Cathy, I don’t think I’ve properly…”

“Steed, if you persist in this ridiculous need to apologize every time I see you, we shall soon be strangers.”

There was that old sardonic glance. “I was about to say that I don’t think I’ve properly brewed it. A bit light, don’t you think?”

Cathy dipped her head in slight embarrassment. “I really can’t tell, you know.”

He ignored her statement, gazing into his own cup. “I am grateful, though.”

“For the beans?”

“For what you did in the Highlands.”

“Really, Steed, it was no more than anyone would have done in the same position.”

“That’s not true. There are many people who would have left me where I was.”

“Not true friends.”

“No. I suppose not.”

Another silence, this one less comfortable. She couldn’t stand his gratitude any more than she could stand the stubborn conviction of his treachery. She wanted things to be as they were, no different. She could put up with his cynicism, his manipulative games, his lascivious sense of humor. She could not put up with his deference. 

“I got you something,” said Steed, digging into his pocket. He dropped the little box into her lap with no ceremony. He didn’t even let go of his coffee cup. Cathy took it up and opened it, half afraid that he had made good on his threat to propose to her once they got back to London. It was not a ring. Just a small, plain locket, unaustentacious but pretty, on a delicate silver chain. She turned it over and read the date on the back. The day she had saved him from the Wringer. 

“Open it,” said Steed. 

Cathy gently snapped the locket open. One side was a little watch face, ticking away. A small piece of metal was lodged in the other.

“What is it?” 

“The bullet that McEwan took out of your arm.”

Cathy’s eyebrows went up. “That’s a bit morbid, Steed.”

“Is it?” Steed shrugged. “You don’t have to keep it.” He paused. “No one has ever taken a bullet for me before.”

Cathy looked down at the frivolous bit of metal. She pushed it back into the locket and snapped it shut. 

“Thank you, Steed.”

“My pleasure, Mrs. Gale.”

They finished their coffee in an unknown serenity, then she rose to go. He walked her to the door, helped her on with her coat, his hands lingering on her arms as he did so. Curious tenderness, those moments when he seemed to want to be close to her without ulterior motives. She turned to him. Many different expressions had played across that face in the past weeks, but none so alarming as the vulnerability she caught as she turned. He masked it quickly. 

“Good night, Cathy,” he said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Good night, Steed. Yes, of course.” 

She didn’t know what possessed her. Perhaps it gratitude for his attempts to take care of her, perhaps simply an impulse to surprise him. But she reached up and pressed a soft kiss to his rough cheek before exiting the apartment. She stood on the stairwell, wondering what expression those eyes had now. She was still wondering when she got home.


End file.
